The company is getting ready to go all-in on cloud services

Aug 10, 2013 10:48 GMT  ·  By

Microsoft continues the struggle to become a truly powerful devices and services company and one of the projects that could help it achieve this goal is a cloud operating system tailored for the government.

Long-time Microsoft watcher Mary Jo Foley writes that Microsoft's new project might include one or even more versions of an operating system not necessarily based on Windows Azure that could be designed for government customers.

Citing insiders, Foley reports that the current codename of the operating system is Fairfax, which could be an indication that Microsoft is indeed preparing a new product for the US government. Fairfax, Virginia is not only the home of the General Services Administration, but also a key location for several US agencies.

As compared to Windows Azure, the new cloud operating system would provide enhanced security, so the service won't be exclusively running on Microsoft's servers. Instead, the government will also bring its very own systems, just to make sure that no data can be compromised.

Given the fact that CEO Steve Ballmer is striving to make Microsoft much more than a powerful software giant, such a project pretty much makes sense.

Ballmer has already revealed that cloud is playing a key role for the Redmond-based company, so an operating system specifically designed for governments would give the firm an important advantage in the fight with the other companies in this side of the industry.

“Just about six or seven years ago, I started talking about the cloud here at WPC. And it was highly unpopular the first time I talked about it, because it looked like an end around,"  Ballmer said during the WPC 2013 conference in Houston, Texas, explaining that Microsoft is betting big on cloud services.

"And yet I think today everybody understands that this is the future of innovation. Even Windows, if you think about it, has really always been much more of a device than a piece of software.”